Sermon Tone Analysis

Behold He Comes

Welcome (Sterling Tollison)

Scripture Reading (Hebrews 10:23-25)

Prayer of Praise (God is Savior), Phoebe Garcia

10,000 Reasons (Bless the Lord)

I Will Glory in My Redeemer

Prayer of Confession (lust), Sam Garcia

How Great Thou Art

PBC Catechism #32

How important is the local church?

We believe the local church is central to God’s plan for believers.

Pastoral Prayer (Mike Klaassen)

SERMON

Family dinners matter.

Researchers have shown that the time-tested tradition of a family gathering around a dinner table talking to one another has a host of positive benefits.

Dinnertime conversations are proven to increase vocabulary even more than reading books aloud to your children.[1]

Want to know the easiest way to predict high achievement scores among middle and high schoolers?

Don’t look first to the time spent at school or doing homework.

Look at their family’s mealtime habits.[2]

Additional benefits of family dinners include an overall healthier lifestyle, reduction of symptoms in various medical disorders, decreased anxiety, lower likelihood of high-risk teenage behaviors like smoking, binge drinking, marijuana use, and more.

These benefits have led one Harvard professor to conclude that family dinners are “the most important thing you can do with your kids.”[3]

Family dinners matter more than many people think.

The same is true for gatherings at your local church.

Showing up matters more than many people think.

And yet, like the many families who neglect the healthy habits of a technology-free dinner, there are far too many professing Christians who neglect the importance of regularly gathering with God’s people.

Several years ago, Thom Rainer said this about declining church attendance in America:

“The number one reason for the decline in church attendance is that members attend with less frequency than they did just a few years ago.

Allow me to explain. . . .

if 200 members attend every week the average attendance is, obviously, 200.

But if one-half of those members miss only one out of four weeks, the attendance drops to 175.

Did you catch that?

No members left the church.

Everyone is still relatively active in the church.

But attendance declined over 12 percent because half the members changed their attendance behavior slightly.”[4]

Most Christians would agree that church attendance matters.

But far too often our actions speak louder than words.

Far too often we say showing up matters, but we act as if it only matters when it’s convenient.

Perhaps what we need is to recapture a good theology of church attendance.

Normal approach: expository preaching through books of the Bible

Today, week 2 of 5-week series on our five identities

We are worshipers

Turn in your Bibles to Hebrews 10:23

Written in the early 60s AD to show Christians the supremacy of Christ

Better than angels, Moses, the priests, better covenant, better sacrifice

Not enough to say we believe these things, we must continue in them

Hebrews 10:23-25—Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful.

And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near.”

Three Questions About Church Attendance:

Christian: may God use these truths in His Word to help you to think, feel and act rightly about going to church

Unbeliever: you’re sitting in on a family conversation, but we hope to show you one of the ways that you should count the cost before you follow Jesus

1) WHO Should Attend Church?

Question is not, who CAN attend church?

Answer to that question is anybody and everybody!!!

We should welcome anyone who attends

Churches go wrong when they go beyond making everyone welcome to making everyone comfortable

Things at PBC that make unbelievers uncomfortable

Who SHOULD attend church?

Those commanded to not neglect the gathering are the same individuals commanded to “hold fast to their confession of hope.”

This “confession of hope” is nothing less than our faith in the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

EXPLAIN THE GOSPEL

Not a Christian: what you need is to repent and believe this Gospel!

Christian: this passage is talking to you.

It is you who must faithfully gather with God’s people.

Not your agnostic neighbor or your Muslim co-worker.

Of course, they’re welcome to attend.

And if they do, let’s pray they hear the Gospel and believe it.

But the fact is, church attendance is primarily for the saved, not the lost.

You need church attendance because you claim to be a Christian.

And one of the ways God helps you cling to that claim is your faithful attendance.

2) WHY Should We Attend Church?

Kent Hughes—“On the most elementary level, you do not have to go to church to be a Christian.

You do not have to go home to be married either.

But in both cases if you do not, you will have a very poor relationship.”[6]

There are benefits of going to church for the Christian!

Let’s consider three from the text...

A) It Helps You Hold Onto Hope

v. 23—Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful.

One of the ways we do that is by “not neglecting to meet together.”

One of the fruits of faithfully gathering with God’s people is a greater grip on the hope of the Gospel.

John Owen—“Whatever reserves men may have in their minds, that they would still continue to believe in Christ though they attended not … in these assemblies, [God] regards it not.”[5]

You may say to yourself “I don’t need to attend church to keep hoping,” but you’d be wrong.

If your hope is leaking, perhaps it’s because your grip on God’s people is loosening.

Or you may think you’re holding onto hope just fine, thank you very much.

But do not be deceived, God is not mocked (Galatians 6:7).

If you sow a loose grip on God’s people you will reap a loose grip on Gospel hope.

If you want a strong, hope-filled relationship with the Lord, you’ll cultivate a strong habit of faithful attendance to the gatherings in your local church.

B) It Provokes You to Love and Good Works

v. 24—And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works...

I love the way the KJV translates this, “let us consider one another to provoke unto love and to good works.

This can happen in various ways...

The nursery volunteers seem a bit frazzled when you drop off your children before the service, and you’re provoked to be especially encouraging and thankful when you pick the kids up later.

Right after you get settled into your seat a man comes up to you and thanks you for the prayer of confession you led a few weeks ago.

He shares how the Lord has given him increased victory over that sin since your prayer.

A fellow church member sitting near you has tears streaming down her face as she sings, “through many dangers toils and snares, I have already come.”

You know the year she’s had, and you’re provoked to invite her to lunch after service to see how she’s doing.

The pastor encourages you to meet someone you don’t know, and you take him up on the challenge sparking a new and beautiful friendship.

Notice also that this provocation to love and good works is a two-way street.

You’re provoking others and they’re provoking you.

C) It Helps You Persevere

v. 25—“not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near.”